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Brown, Donald R.The Patterning of Students in their GroupRelationships.Minnesota Univ., Minneapolis.6616p.; Paper presented at a series of Seminars on theSocial Psychology of the Future State MetropolitanCampus, the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis,February 24, 1966

EDRS Price MF-$0.25 HC-$0.90Attitudes, Disadvantaged Youth, *GroupingProcedures, *Higher Education, Responsibility,*Students, Urban Environment, *Urban Universities,*Values*Michigan University Pilot Project

The dominant images that have characterized periods- "intellectualism" of the '30s, purposefulness of the '40s, "apathy"of the '50s, and "idealism" of the '60s - represent population ratherthan value changes. It may be generally assumed that students come tocollege believing, to various degrees, that college is a place (1)for intellectual development and growth of personality; (2) foracquisition of vocational training; or (3) to have fun. These viewsare generally incongruent with the values of the faculty, andstudents thus tend to seek support from peer groups. As a result ofincreased awareness, the freshman becomes quickly aware of thehypocrisy and cynicism found in many corners of our society. Incollege, he should ideally learn how to evaluate what he perceives ina way that permits change and development, but does not lead toalienation. If he does not learn this, he may adopt a set of valuesby imitation of his peer group. Urban universities will be challengedby more students from deprived backgrounds, student militancy, andthe need for adult and community education. Universities can groupstudents in such a way as to maximize educational benefits. (AF)

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rrNTHE PATTERNING OF STUDENTS

C:) IN THEIR GROUP RELATIONSHIPSCI

Donald R. BrownCenter for Research on Learning and Teaching

University of Michigan

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH, EDUCATION & WELFARE

OFFICE OF EDUCATION

THIS DOCUMENT HAS BEEN REPRODUCED EXACTLY AS RECEIVED FROM THE

PERSON OR ORGANIZATION ORIGINATING IT. POINTS OF VIEW OR OPINIONS

STATED DO NOT NECESSARILY REPRESENT OFFICIAL OFFICE OF EDUCATION

POSITION OR POLICY.

THE PATTERNING OF STUDENTSIN THEIR GROUP RELATIONSHIPS *

Donald R. BrownCenter for Research on Learning and Teaching

University of Michigan

It is with well advised humility that I venture to speakto you about the urban university of the future in general, andabout groups, in particular. The reason for this humilityis that I come to you unbiased and practically untarnished byrelevant experience in urban universities and as one whoputs more emphasis on individual development and determi-nation than on group phenomena. In fact, the more I pon-dered the image of myself pontificating about groups in thelocale of an urban university, the more my own experienceas an undergraduate at a semi-urban, private university, asa graduate at a semi-urban, state university, and my 13years as a faculty member in the cloistered atmosphere of asmall Quaker women's college along with 10 years as a re-search consultant to the Mellon Foundation studies at Vas-sar, the more I felt drawn to the phrase "the social psychol-ogy" in the title of your 25th anniversary series. Havingorganized and participated in a symposium at the AmericanPsychological Association meetings in San Francisco over adecade ago with the title of "The Social Psychology of HigherEducation," which ultimately resulted in the publication ofthe volume edited by Nevitt Sanford called, The AmericanColle e: A Ps cholo Leal and Social Interpretation of Hi herEducation, I feel at least comfortable in discussing some ofthe implications of this approach to the future of highereducation, whether it be in the setting of a state urban-university or a quite different locale.

SOCIAL CULTURAL ENVIRONMENTOF A UNIVERSITY

All of this is not to say that the social cultural environ-ment of the university does not play a very important role in

tt the structuring of student life, but rather to point out thatregardless of the power of the group in influencing and di-recting the behavior of the individual--whether in a univer-sity or any other area of lifein the final analysis, thegroup operates as a subculture which provides, for the in-dividual, characteristic ranges of stimulation, goals and

*Presented at a Series of Seminars on the Social Psychologyof the Future State Urban Campus, The University ofMinnesota, Minneapolis, February 24, 1966.

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rewards. For these stimuli, goals and rewards to be

effective, they must be perceived, internalized and appreci-

ated by the individual. In the last analysis it is through the

individual that all group effects are mediated.

The reason for this disclaimer is to permit me, if

you will, to direct your attention to an approach to the un-

derstanding of the groupings of students in institutions of

higher education through a model which starts with a devel-

opmental theory of the individual in a complex social envi-

ronment such as a university. I would argue that, if an

individual is thwarted in this developmental sequence, he

will often be forced to turn to readily available groups for

his goals and rewards. This anchoring in a theory of indi-

vidual development has many advantages when we are forced

to operate, as we are, in a highly pluralistic educationalsociety such as ours. Perhaps I can make this point more

clearly by referring to descriptions of students and their

approach to education in different historical eras. It is

always helpful before one views with alarm the present situa-

tion to look back and try to understand the alarming situa-

tions of the past. Let me start by reference to a statement,

called to my attention by Professor George Stern, written by

one of the great Eton masters in the 1860's--a period when

education of any sort, higher or otherwise, was reserved

for a social-cultural elite. "You go to school at the age of

12 or 13; and for the next 4 or 5 years you are not engaged

so much in acquiring knowledge as in making mental efforts

under criticism. A certain amount of knowledge you can

indeed with average faculties acquire so as to retain; nor

need you regret the hours that you have spent on much that is

forgotten, for the shadow of lost knowledge at least protects

you from any illusions. But you go to a great school, not

for knowledge as much as for arts and habits; for the habit of

attention, for the art of expression, for the art of assuming

at a moment's notice a new intellectual posture, for the art

of entering quickly into another person's thoughts, for the

habit of submitting to censure and refutation, for the art of

indicating assent or dissent in graduated terms, for the

habits of regarding minute points of accuracy, for the habit

of working out what is possible in a given time, for taste,

for discrimination, for mental courage and mental sober-

ness. Above all, you go to a great school for self know -

ledge. "4`

*Quoted by Geoffrey Madan in "William Cory," The

Cornhill Magazine, July to December 1938, p. 208, from an

1861 tract on "Eton Reform" by William Cory.

As one ponders on Cory's statement, one cannot helpbut be reminded of Philip Franck's warning that the meta-physics of yesterday is the common sense of today and thenonsense of tomorrow. That is to say, that while what Corydescribes as the goals of a liberal arts education still holdtoday as they did in the 1860's in upper-class England, none-theless the sociological derivations of our students in theurban university of the 1960's differs considerably, and 25years from now will differ even more. For many years ourstudents came from much the same social class as thosethat Cory was describing. But sometime shortly after WorldWar I the proportion of Americans attending high school in-creased astronomically and this desire for education burstinto the college scene about the time of World War II andhas been increasing ever since so that today we find it nec-essary to think at least 25 years ahead in order to be pre-pared for the ever-increasing onslaught of students. This isbound to have far-reaching consequences on the nature ofeducation and the needs that students bring to our institu-tions of higher learning. How has this manifested itselfsince World War. II?

POST WORLD WAR II

Consider the bulging enrollments immediately fol-lowing the war, when the veterans were flocking to our cam-puses. These were young men and women of above averagecollege age who had been brought up during the great depres-sion and then tempered in the fiery inferno of World War II.Their values and goals were clear. They knew who thegreat enemies were. First there were the problems of eco-nomic inequity and irresponsibility which could be defeatedby the "new economics" and later there were the evils oftotalitarianism and fascism over which they had waged along and bitter physical struggle ending in total victory, orso it seemed. Now they retreated to the nurturing securityof alma mater with the help of a benevolent G. I. bill to pre-pare themselves for the fruits of the better life for whichthey had made so many sacrifices. This of course is mygeneration. We knew what we were doing in college and ourdevotion to our studies and our pragmatic approach to thecurriculum had profound effects on the university. Practi-cally overnight the Hollywood rah-rah culture of the cam-puses was dealt its death blow and ultimately finished off bythe rise of the meritocracy following the launching of Sput-nik. Immediately following this group on the campus, therecame the children of the new affluent society now coming tocollege in much larger numbers than ever before and conse-quently from much more diverse educational and culturalbackgrounds. Our attention was called quite forcibly to theirappearance and to the disparity from the good old days at

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"City College," when no one but first class intellects popu-lated the campuses with real commitment and social concernmanifested on every side. Philip Jacob, in his study onvalue change in college students, summarizes the orienta-tion of this new group as 1) an absorbing self-interestedness,directed essentially toward satisfying desires for materialwell being, privacy within one's own male-oriented familydomain, and relief from boredom; 2) group dependence,which causes students to bring personal conduct and stan-dards into line with the expectations of groups to whom theyturn for a sense of belongingness; or look upon as vehiclesto self advancement; 3) social and political indifference andirresponsibility; and 4) an instrumental approach to reasonand morality which pulls both reason and moral code into theservice of preset personal goals rather than acknowledgesthem as guides of verity and controlling rules of conduct.

MICHIGAN NOW

Jacob was of course describing what we all came tothink of as the age of student apathy--in many ways a mostcomforting age during which to be a member of the estab-lishment. Contrast this description with a quote from anarticle which appeared last Sunday in the Michigan Daily:"The American Student is Breaking Out of His Cocoon" isthe leadk

"The eruption started in the late 50's when students(whose older brothers and sisters had thought the smoothmove was to mind one's own business) were stirred by theCivil Rights movement and began to emerge from their studycarrels and fraternity houses to make their dent on theworld.

They were a new generation bred in prosperity.These students did not know the depression, they did not re-member the war. To seek material reward--the house inScarsdale, the pretty wife, and the steady job--was notenough because it was so attainable. To be satisfied with areturn to normalcy was not enough because normalcy wasalready the way of life.

They took their tactics from Ghandi, their idealismfrom philosophy class, their money from Daddy. Theyworked hand in hand with civil rights groups such as CORE,NAACP, SNCC, and SCLC.

The results of the movement were civil rights acts,the voting rights bill, and the emergence of the Americanstudent.

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Realizing they had the power to influence events, stu-dents broadened their involvement so that it ranged fromcriticizing foreign policy to organizing the poor.

Thus, the idealism of the civil rights movement led toan alienation from the multi-university and the hope for anidyllic "community of scholars" as the wave of the future.The democratic nature of the movement led students to hopethey could have a meaningful voice in governing their ownaffairs at their universities; and the success of the move-ment made students realize that they could implement theirgoals. "*

VALUE AND POPULATION CHANGES

One is aware, naturally, that any attempt to describeall students at all institutions is a task fraught with folly.These descriptions that I have given as applicable to histor-ical periods cver the last 100 years refer not even to themodal situation but rather to the salient situation. Theytend to represent the highly visible peaks of student behaviorin the mass rather than individual students on the one handor the majority of students on the other. These are thedominant images that characterized the periods, not neces-sarily the dominant behavior. Even if we take a franklysociological view of the matter and attempt to understandthese seeming changes in the value orientation of universitystudents as reflections of the population from which they arerecruited, from this view we know that college going has notonly increased numerically but has increasingly attractedsegments of our population with different "life expectancies"from those to which the more traditional liberal arts curric-ulum was originally attuned. We are dealing here with apopulation change rather than value change. For example,the increasing numbers of veterans attending college on theG. I. bill and its various revisions since World War II,working class children attending on government loans orstate scholarship programs, the meritorious attending onNational Merit Scholarships and similar competitive awardsfor students with outstanding high school attainment, Negroyouth attending on the various new grants directed towardtheir recruitment, children of immigrants located by nation-wide talent searches - -all of these groups bring new valueconstellations to our colleges, and the realities of theirpostcollege lives will undoubtedly be different from those ofthe classical liberal arts college student who could postponehis vocational plans until graduate school and even some-times forever. It's interesting to speculate on the

* The Michigan Daily, February 20, 1966

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differences in the atmosphere of universities which followsfrom the obvious fact that not only have the sources of stu-dents changed, as the well established universities have in-creasingly culled off the cream of admissions and therebygotten a much broader geographic representation in theirstudent bodies and the large state universities have dippedmuch further down to sample the real sources of intellectualquality in their states, while at the same time, the recruit-ment of faculty has been very much influenced by theseprevious population shifts in college attendance. It is notidle speculation to propose that a large per cent of facultyjust now entering into senior positions come from the G. I.bill crop which flooded graduate schools with the sorts ofPh. D. material that rarely aspired to such educationalheights before. As I look back on my own college experi-ence, I am struck by how much more similar in socio-economic background current faculties are to their studentsthan my faculty, which tended to represent a kind of upper-class traditional scholarly gentlemen with considerablefamily wealth. All of this is bound to make for changes inthe groupings of students in the urban university a quarterof a century from now.

THREE COLLEGE IMAGES - INTELLECTUAL,VOCATIONAL, AND SOCIAL

The above merely indicates to me the striking plural-ism of American society and the consequent pluralism thatwe can expect in our urban universities in the future. Letus now try to analyze this diverse population and presentsome theoretical assumptions about the nature of develop-ment in students which would allow me to talk about the sig-nificance of the groupings of students that we might find onour urban campuses 25 years from today. For the sake ofargument I will maintain that at the moment students cometo us holding to varying degrees one of the following oftenmutually exclusive stereotypes of the purposes of higher ed-ucation. The first relates to the development of the intellectand the growth of the personality. Here the emphasis is onthe broadening of the intellectual horizons of the studentsalong with the consequent maturing and stabilizing of thepersonality. The liberal arts curriculum as classically de-fined is accepted as the golden road to these goals and theproduct is hopefully "cultured." The stress in this type ofeducation is on being. The image is best represented by thestatement which I quoted from the Eton schoolmaster, Cory.The image today is still, represented by some of the pres-tigeful colleges -- particularly some of the smaller membersof the seven women's ellleges conference, which are pres-tigeful not so mvich because of their lofty educational aimsbut because these aims are generally supported by the upperclasses, and in particular for women. It is the desire to

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identify with these classes that accounts for the current ele-vation in the desirability of attending one of these institu-tions. Secondly, there is the much more widely held imageof college as a place to acquire occupational training. As asociety becomes both affluent and technologically advanced,the demand for highly trained personnel increases. Thecolleges rush in to fill the demands of the market, albeitsometimes with reluctance. The urban state university ex-periences great pressure to fulfill this type of demand aris-ing from its constituents. This, at the same time, in-creases the demand for the college degree and cheapens itas a symbol of professionalization. The degree comes tocover a multitude of sins committed in the name of educa-tion. All sorts of occupational groups join in and demandcollege programs in their fields. The emphasis is on doingand on being able to do rather than on being. The thirddominant image relates to the collegiate fun culture which isthe one most often portrayed in the mass media image ofcollege, particularly before the rise of the meritocracy.However, the idea of college as a never-ending series of in-creasingly romantic social events leading to blissful unionto be punctuated by glorious homecomings is still a realimage for adolescent girls in particular. Here the empha-sis is on learning the sex role as popularly conceived. Per-haps this image never did exist in any large extent in thestreetcar type of urban university.

The students, coming as they do from the larger soci-ety, bring with them one or another of these three views ofhigher education. Therefore they start their college expe-rience with views that are to varying degrees incongruentwith the generally held values of the faculty. The latter seethemselves as seekers of knowledge in specialized areas andcritics of the culture. Indeed, they demand special privi-leges of tenure and academic freedom in order to permit theunhampered pursuit of these goals. In recent years becauseof the nature of the market, they have indeed demanded al-most total freedom even from teaching. At the same timethey are asked to educate a semi-captive audience who holdvalues often widely discrepant from their own views andvery often widely variant within any given classroom. Hereare certainly the seeds of conflict.

STUDENT PEER CULTURE

The students are not without resources of their ownfor avoiding the issues of this conflict and the educationalbenefits which follow from its rational resolution. Theycreate a "peer culture" which largely perpetuates the gen-eral societal values held outside the college and turn to thisnew subculture for their goals and their rewards. The

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challenge for the urban state university, as for any univer-sity, is to become aware of the groupings or subculturesthat exist amongst its students so that they can rationallyplan to enlist the forces which are often very powerful in-herent in these groups to influence the openness of theirmembers and your students to new experiences. At thispoint we see the mediation between the individual view, and

the social groups approach.

As we have seen the society and, indeed, often theuniversity are not completely clear about the goals of higher

education. Therefore, it is not surprising that the students,

unable to face the multiplicity of challenges to their self

image, find themselves forced to seek clarity in groupidentifications which reinforce the old and familiar. In the

case of male students, with their ever-increasing commit-

ments to an occupational role, the ability to fuse the con-trasting value orientations is often rather painless andusually with considerable social support in the service of

occupational preparation. This situation is not so painlessfor women, and, indeed, with the increasing intolerance for

idiosyncratic roles such as that of feminism, this situation

is becoming even more confusing rather than less.

UNDERSTANDING LATE ADOLESCENCE

Having described the general value conflict of societyin higher education, let me now turn to the entering fresh-man. If we think of the stage of late adolescent developmentthat precedes young adulthood, we can assume that the en-tering college student is somewhere in this stage on his way

to goals of higher integration and more precise differentia-tion of personality. The striking fact of this stage is theascendancy of the cognitive And rational controlling mecha-nisms over the impulses which previously dominated thedeterminants of behavior. These controls are not yetmature; they tend to be rigid, overdetermined, and impulse

seems capable of bursting through at any point. This is trueto some extent of all of our students regardless of whetherthey are living in residence with the college in locusparentis or whether they are townies. Sanford, in TheAmerican College, has put it well when he describesfreshman as follows: The freshman tends to be like a con-vert to adulthood, an enthusiastic supporter and imitator ofadult ways who knows what it is to backslide--which hesometimes does. The achievement of flexible control, anarrangement in which there is genuine freedom of impulsesbecause there is little danger of their getting out of hand lies

ahead; nevertheless impulses are now inhibited or containedwith sufficient effectiveness so that the young person canturn his attention to other matters. He is not ready to con-centrate upon his relations with the external world--to

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improve his understanding of that world and to find a placewithin it." This state of affairs offers both an opportunityand a danger to the development of a system of adult values.After all, one of the main functions of the university is todevelop resources within the individual for that peculiarlyhuman function--the ability to evaluate and act on the basisof one's evaluational decision. Turned as they are to theoutside world, freshmen are sensitive to and capable ofidentifying with a whole new range of adult models and in-stitutions on which can be based an often new and broaderset of values. However, also as a consequence of increasedawareness and greater cognitive sensitivity, the freshmanbecomes aware, often for the first time, of the corruption,hypocrisy, and cynicism to be found in many corners of acomplex society such as ours. Also they are brought to-gether in new groupings with new temptations for challengingand exciting activities and intellectual patterns. It couldwell be pointed out here that we have only recently seensome of the results of this awareness where it would appearthat a significant minority of the students have suddenlytaken the first image of higher education that I presentedvery seriously indeed only to discover that the institution orestablishment as they refer to it was no longer as committedto this image as they had been led to believe. Indeed, a lotof the recent -3- called conflict on the campuses centersabout the students' discovery that the university is not de-voted solely to their immediate and personal educational de-velopment. In many of them this seems like a betrayal butof course on more mature reflection they come to realizethe multiplicity of the university as a mirror of the multi-plicity of the society from whence they come. It remainsthen a challenge to higher education to guide the studentthrough this crises toward the ability to evaluate and judgewhat is perceived in a way that permits change and develop-ment but does not lead to complete alienation from parents,community and society. What is desired is an internalizedsense of values based on a strongly developed sense of dig-nity and pride in self. Upon arrival at college, even in theurban university, to some extent the immediate support offamily and community are withdrawn or at least alienated,and as contact is made with new systems of value, thefreshman seeks new sources of support. The easy choice isthe readily available support of peers who minimize thethreat by offering a subculture in which the student can morereadily determine his own stake. If this total identificationwith the peer cultures which exist within and on the periph-ery of an institution persists for four years in an unalteredform, education will be a failure. It will fail because thestudent will either keep a value structure which developedbefore college and will remain untested against the broaderhorizons of the university or because, in his anxiety to avoid

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rejection by the valued group, he will adopt a set of valuesby simple imitation. Values acquired in this manner,whether from faculty or through the influence of student culture, are not internalized but are merely borrowed for theoccasion. For values to become internalized they must bereflected on and made the object of the individual's bestefforts at judgment and decision making.

Closely related to the internalization of value is thedevelopment of self esteem, which also is at first verysensitive to the appraisal of peers and faculty. The devel-opment of self esteem will ultimately lead to a sense ofidentity and mastery but this goal may take all of college andlonger to be reached. Therefore it is important for the in-stitution t.o provide a readily open channel for its students toswitch identities often during their college careers if both toavoid too narrow a range of choices and too early commit-ments which will hamstring the individual for life. For ex-ample, a young woman who flees into marriage in the soph-omore year has chosen sides too soon to maximize her de-velopment.

THREE DIMENSIONS OF STUDENT GROWTH

What can the college do to foster growth during theseyears? In general there are three main dimensions alongwhich students can be expected to grow which are very muchinfluenced by the curriculum and the social groupings whichexist at the institution. They are 1) freeing the impulsethrough the opportunity to learn and to manipulate the sym-bols of human experience in imagination through literature,philosophy and the arts while not directly committing one-self. Let us not underestimate the value of empathy throughimagination in the overall educational process.

2) enlightenment of conscience to the point where theindividual believes in what he ought to do because he hasarrived at a moral code by reasoned judgment and knowl-edge. Contact with diversity, training in disciplined anal-ysis of thought, and a tolerant but committed faculty are in-valuable here along with, of course, sound liberal artscoverage of content.

3) differentiation and integration of the ego such thatthe student increases his scope while becoming more of aunity. That is, perceptions and thought become more andmore differentiated and personal responses more and morediscriminating and interrelated. Then a young woman, forexample, could see herself as being both feminine and edu-cated.

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BRINGING STUDENT GROUPS INTO THE SERVICEOF STUDENT DEVELOPMENT

Now the problem that faces the urban university oftoday and one which will increase in the future is how can anincreasingly diverse source of students drawn more andmore widely from all areas of the population as the econom-ic wherewithall for education becmnes more available bebrought together in the common pursuit of these intellectualand personal goals which I have just alluded to. It seemsobvious to me that in order to accomplish this challenginggoal, the university must bring student groups into the ser-vice of student development. In order to do this we mustoperate on several levels at once. For example, it has longbeen assumed by the better residential colleges that studentslargely educate one another even in the most rigorous aca-demic disciplines. But, unfortunately with the rapid expan-sion and increasing specialization of knowledge coupled withthe increasing cafeteria-like offerings of our universities, itis rare that two students come together outside of class whohave a common academic experience to share, Thus theuniversity should consider new ways of grouping studentsboth in the curriculum and in the scheduling such that largernumbers will have some common shared intellectual experi-ence which will serve as a foundation for intellectual andsocial interaction. Very often we now force our students intheir noncurriculum groupings into nonintellective areas ofconcern by denying them easily integrated experiences whichstem from the academic content of their institutional en-deavor.

STUDENTS FROM DEPRIVED BACKGROUNDS

A further expectation for the future urban state univer-sity stems from the increasing proportion of students whowill come from those segments of society which have bae:ato some extent crippled by mistreatment and lack of oppor-tunity in the past. It would be wrong to assume that thesestudents already share the dominant values of the middleclass which tend to be so well entrenched in all of us. Theiraspirations have been thwarted too long for them to burstinto full flower with just a little nourishment. This meansthat the university as it opens its doors--and the urban uni-versity really must--to these peoples must at the same timecarefully evaluate the sort of socialization that these stu-dents must go through before they can really become a partof the academic race. If the university is not willing to faceup to the requirements of this task they are surely allowingthe race to be run against cripples. At the University ofMichigan we have discovered a particularly poignant problemwith those students from deprived backgrounds that have

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been admitted under a special equal opportunity program inrecent years. They have been so removed from the commonexperience of current college-going populations that theystill have a quaint pre-meritocracy image of college life andtherefore feel seriously deprived when life at the universityturns out not to be as presented on television. It is difficultfor them to see that their more fortunate classmates areliving very much the same kind of work-oriented day to daylife at the University. There are serious problems in thearea of socialization to life at the University which must besolved before large numbers of our urban disadvantagedpopulations will be able to feel a part of academia. I amspeaking, here, of course, of those who clearly qualify onintellective and academic criteria. Indeed, the most fre-quent cause for failure on the part of these people appearsto be social failure and lack of a sense of belonging with thepeculiarly devastating effects of that kind of alienation rath-er than lack of ability.

NEW MILITANCY OF STUDENTS

A further characteristic of the state urban universityof the future will be the increasing militancy of the studentstoward a role in running the university. This is an areawhich is fraught with confusion of purpose and aim both onthe part of students and on the part of the faculties and ad-ministrations. One could with President Perkins of Cornellargue that the students after all are at the university tolearn, not to run it. And if one did not want to be so blunt,one could point out that students stay only for a generationof four years whereas the faculty and administration seem-ingly stay on forever, or at any rate so it seems when wefind ourselves having to resolve the same issues year afteryear only with different groups of protesting students whowant a voice in running things their way and who weren't inon the last round of discussions. I am afraid that we aregoing to have to resolve ourselves to even more of thisfatiguing but necessary educational function. I warn you,however, that the students of today have been all too welltrained in the meaning of democracy from that first gradeelection on up. They are terribly sophisticated and sensi-tive to fraud. They will have no part of student govern-ments, committees, advisory panels and all the other para-phernalia that has developed on our campuses over the yearsunless these have functions which are real. Pseudo-responsibilities will be spurned and the students will in-creasingly turn from these false involvements to other con-cerns which stem from the multiplicity of groupings whichwill spontaneously arise on any campus of this size. Manyof these other activities will not be those that we would findconducive to the orderly conduct of the university's business.

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Of course, only a small minority of students will themselveswant to participate actively in the affairs of the universitybut they will be in a position to mobilize their less involvedand active peers if they are treated in a manner not becom-ing intelligent adults. The happy note here is the amazingresponsibility and maturity which the recent generations ofstudents have shown when given real responsibility andpower. When taken into the inner sanctum and franklyapprised of the many elements involved in each day to dayproblem facing the university, they generally react in amost conservative manner befitting those who realize thatthey are as yet poorly equipped to deal with these complexi-ties. I recall the remark by President Elliott ,f Harvardwhen" in 1885 he was apprised of the rules for student gov-ernment which had just been formulated by the Board ofTrustees of Bryn Mawr College. He said, "Bryn MawrCollege for young ladies will be out of business in a year.You cannot treat young ladies with that much freedom andresponsibility." That particular student government isflourishing because it is real and everybody who participatesin it knows that it is real. For those of us who moan aboutthe lack of student interest in the multitude of committeesand organizations that already exist, I suggest that you takea hard look at the real purpose of these institutions possess-ing gruesome immortality and ask if they have not long sinceoutlived their purpose and have failed to take on secondaryfunctions which justify their continued existence. Studentcommittees, like faculty committees, can grow old andtired.

CHALLENGE OF ADULT AND COMMUNITY EDUCATION

One final challenge which will face your universityeven more in the future than now and one which I am sureyou are very much aware of is that of adult education andinvolvement. As an urban university more and more of youralumni will be from the immediate metropolitan area andwill be increasingly involved in the affairs of the university.This can be a great source of support and strength, but itcan also be a terrible drag and concern if the university isunable to count on its alumni when other pressures aredrawn up against it. The urban university must be espe-cially sensitive to the needs of its community at many, manylevels and you will increasingly find yourselves involved insuch diverse areas as urban renewal and continuing educa-tion for women. Both of these are serious social problemsdealing with minorities in their treatment if not in theirnumbers. These urban challenges will often fall upon theshoulders of your student body who after all return at theend of each working day to every corner of the city and will

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represent the university by their attitude and behavior. Willthey derive a sense of concern and a sense of competence todeal with these questions from their experiences on yourcampus? Will the main thrust behind many of the studentgroups that exist and will exist at the University of Minnesotabe oriented toward social amelioration and political activismwhere more than just impulsive acting out is involved butrather deep concern and directed action?

GROUPING STUDENTS FOR EDUCATIONAL BENEFITS

These are only a few of the challenges that will facethe great urban university of the future. I have avoidedmany that more properly fall in the realm of political andfinancial resources to meet the increasing enrollments anddemands of ever growing technologies. There has not beentime to suggest specific areas in which the university canprepare to meet these challenges directly. Let me merelysuggest that a thorough understanding of the developmentalprocesses underlying the growth of both the intellect andpersonality in each individual student will allow you to offerat your university the kind of curriculum best designed tofoster these growth patterns within the context of the facili-ties that you will have at your disposal here at Minnesota.Jpst by way of example, you have it in your power to manip-ulate the formation of groupings amongst your student bodiesin such a way as to enlist this powerful source of pressurein the direction that all of us as humanistically inclined edu-cators support. You can do this by grouping students to-gether in, say, freshman courses in such a way as to maxi-mize their contact, both in and out of class and therebyovercome some of the barriers that young people have to-ward social interaction before they have developed a suffi-cient sense of confidence to overcome their shyness. Theoccasional sparks lit in the classroom will flare up againoutside of class if these students have the opportunity tocome into contact with each other. It is easy to make thesearrangements in small residential colleges; it is a challengeto the ingenuity of schedule makers and administrators toarrange things at the University of Minnesota in this man-ner, but we are doing it at Michigan in our Pilot Projectwhich now includes over 600 freshmen and hope to accom-plish this and more in our Residential experimental collegefor 1200 students which we hope to open in September 1967.I can't go into details about the underlying rationale and theplans for this venture now but hope that during the discus-sion period someone will ask me to expand on this at greatlength. I would be very happy to do so. Let me merelypoint out that one of the fruits of understanding the basic de-velopmental sequence pursued by most students will providea base for the development within the university of a

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multiplicity of educational environments such that the studentby wise guidance and a bit of shopping around can find thosesets of educational conditions and environments which bestsuit his potential and intellectual aspirations. Under thosecircumstances we can hope to maximize the development ofeach student through the concerted effort of the faculty andhis group memberships.

I conclude by reminding you that college educationmust perforce proceed according to assumptions concerningwhat beginning students have in common. Where dissatis-faction with this state of affairs has been great, the tendencyhas been to go to the other extreme and accent the individu-ality of each student. A better view is that whereas eachstudent is in some respects like all other students and insome respects like no other student, it may well turn outthat in the matter of deciding upon educational objectives,possibilities, and instrumentalities, it will be best to con-sider the ways in which he is like some other students whilecreating diverse and pluralistic educational environmentswithin and across institutions.